Why would anyone want to translate one of our articles to a minor European language? The story is more complex than you’d guess…

NRKbeta is a technology blog operated by the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation. From time to time we translate our articles to English, if we think they have relevance beyond Norway. I translated this article anyway, in order to present it to the people mentioned for comment, so here’s an English version for all you non-Norwegian speaking scam lovers out there. The Norwegian version of this article.

An odd request

NRKbeta get a lot of requests. Albert Ward, or Albertio Ward as he called himself the first time he contacted us, remains one of the stranger characters having wanted something from us. Let’s start with his name and his stilted English – for my inner eye he conjured up a cross between Albert Schweitzer:

Albert Schweitzer, Deutsches Bundesarchiv, Wikimedia Commons

… and a genial, exiled Hungarian translator we as children called «The Postage Stamp Man», because he (without darker motives, it must be stressed) offered stamps to boys he met (and scraps to girls) where I grew up.

I’ve known you website for ages, strictly speaking from year 2007. I found interesting your publication «GIRLS ONLY: Hva engasjerer jente-nerds?» which I googled on http://nrkbeta.no/2010/07/01/girls-only-hva-engasjerer-jente-nerds/ ! I’d love to use it in a project I’m involved with called «Bulgarian FCW Science», so I’m seeking your permission for translation to Bulgarian language. «Bulgarian FCW Science» is a freemium-model non-English language orientated startup with collection of scientific articles, personal notes etc. in several languages that is collaboratively edited by volunteers from around the world since 1999. Young and old, students and professors – even your neighbor could be a volunteer member.

If you agree, we will credit you for your work in the resulting translation’s references by stating that it was based on your work and is used with your permission, and by mentioning the name of my project «Bulgarian FCW Science» back to:
http://nrkbeta.no/2010/07/01/girls-only-hva-engasjerer-jente-nerds/

Thank you for your time and patience.
I look forward to your response next week.

—
Wishing you the best,
Albertio Ward
Bulgaria
(GMT +1) 01.12.2011

Fishy. Also, I’m not altogether sure if there might be legal barbs lurking in that second passage.

We aim to please

But we believe in sharing, and want to be pleasant – and there’s maybe a 0,001% chance that the inquiry is for real. Also, despite the strangeness of it all, I did get curious as to where this might lead, so I gave an answer that might take us further, without committing us more than strictly necessary:

Albert answers

Was a pleasure to translate this publication (http://nrkbeta.no/2010/07/01/girls-only-hva-engasjerer-jente-nerds/)! It’s related to my professional interests, so I thought – why not, if the author allows to do so.

Posted my translation on the blog. If you don’t mind can you publish a tiny link with a text:

Editor’s note:At NRKbeta we’re normally linking to things we write about. In this particular article we haven’t linked to some of the web sites we’re writing about, to avoid giving them link juice. If you’d like a closer look at the pages we’re writing about, you’ll have to remove the spaces in the URls. We apologise for the inconvenience.

or whatever you feel is right. Thanks!

—
Regards,
Albert Ward
(GMT +2), 12.02.2012

Notice that cute little «If you don’t mind» in there.

You might notice that he’s trimmed his name down from the ultra exotic Albertio to the somewhat more common Albert. But that name is working as well. By all means.

The web page Albertio is sending me to is just giving an error message, so I report this back to him. The only thing I find there, is articles in strange languages, à la these:

eksempel på artikler fra fatcow . com / edu

A few weeks go by, before Albert comes back to me on this. But four days before he gets as far as answering my question about the error, he pops me a reminder: Could I please put a tiny link to his translation on my web page?

Greetings,
Can I ask you for a favor? Please place a tiny link back to the translation (http://www . fatcow . com/edu/girls-only-bg/), does not matters where on the page http://nrkbeta.no/2010/07/01/girls-only-hva-engasjerer-jente-nerds/. Not being able to announce it otherwise, I ask you for linking back to the translation to spread the good news around the globe. If not completely contrary to your principles and linking habits :),

—
Regards,
Albert Ward
(GMT +2), 22.02.2012

Why on earth would you want that, Albert?

I Google Albertio Ward. It turns out that many have published links to his translations. Maybe because they’ve been flattered by his request, or they felt they owed him something, it might be because they think the translation could be genuinely useful to anyone, or whatever.

This is giving us an idea about what it is Albert actually wants: A link from us. NRKbeta chooses to play along. We throw in our fishing line, though we stop short of actually putting up a link for now:

Anders Hofseth
Feb 23

Hi Albert
Of course I can 🙂
I’m thinking about doing an article on your translation services, can you tell me a bit more about it?

The translation

The so-called translation eventually shows up, and I do an A/B comparison with Google Translate. They are very similar. But not identical. But what does strike me, is that the automatic Google Translation and Albert’s allegedly manual translation have so many similarities. Unlike what you’d expect to get out of a Google Translate between two insignificant European languages belonging to two different language groups. But I’m really bad at reading Cyrillic letters, so I need to consult with an expert. My former colleague Stoyan is a Bulgarian. I find him on Facebook, and ask him:

Right. Definitely machine translation, he says. We’ll have to see what we can get Albert to tell us before he evaporates.

Albert’s next letter arrives March 3rd.

Albert Ward
Mar 3

Hello Anders,

Sending some information about our organization «Translation for Education»,
I’m sure you find it interesting: http://goo.gl/3C5fk

I hope it will be possible for you to put a link to my translation
somewhere on the page with the original source.

But I am very concerned about it, as I have not heard from you for more than a half month. Is there a chance, that you will publish the link to my translation http://www . fatcow . com/edu/girls-only-bg/ in any foreseeable future? I would truly appreciate a quick note regarding this, so that I will not send you anything else if you are not interested in the localization.
Hope to receive a response from you soon,

—
Best regards,
Albert Ward
(GMT +2), 15.03.2012

A few weeks later I answer him with a few specific questions. I was being childish, maybe, but I had to put in that last line. The line goes under his radar, and he’s answering friendly:

Anders Hofseth
Mar 30

Hi Albertio
Sorry for being late in getting back to you, I’ve been away for a couple of weeks. I think your project is very exciting, and I’d really like to write an article about it on nrkbeta.no

A short interview for the article:

• Can you tell me a little about the process of translating from Norwegian to Bulgarian?

• Are you a native Bulgarian yourself, or Bulgarian speaking from another country?

• If any of our readers should want to join your organization, how should they get in contact, have you got a contact email address, a web page or something?

Hope you can find the time to answer these, and spread awareness about your operation 🙂

Sincerely,

-anders

Albert Ward
Apr 9

Greetings,
Nice to hear back from you.
I am very glad you are interested in the project.
So, the answers:
1. The process of translation from Norwegian into Bulgarian is the same as translation process of other languages.
2. I am Bulgarian myself. My family is originated from Bulgaria.
3. Our organization is open to collaboration with other translators. If anybody knows a language that is need by our readers – we are open to work with him.
If you have any further questions, please let me know.

And we’re rolling! So far, so good. I do a couple of follow-ups. Not the questions that burn the most, but the burning questions would most probably shut him up. I ask about his relationship to Norway instead.

Anders Hofseth
Apr 9

Great!
To 1) – I mean; how do you translate from Norwegian to Bulgarian; do you know Norwegian yourself, or do you use Google Translate, a dictionary or something in the process?

To 3) What is the best way for our readers to get in touch with your organisation, and how can they know what languages are needed – I’ve only found your translations, not a web page. Do you have a web page coordinating your efforts? What is the web address?

Hey! Albert knows Norwegian as well!

Albert Ward
Apr 12

Greetings,
First of all, I would like to tell you that I know Norwegian by myself and I use dictionary when I have some doubts on terminology.
Secondly, the website I provided is the only website we have. If any of its readers wish to get in touch with me, there contact details on the page.
So, what do you think of my request?
Looking forward to hearing soon from you.
All the best,
Albert Ward.

Wow. We’ll credit that:

Anders Hofseth
Apr 12

Hi Albert
That’s impressive! I guess knowing Bulgarian, Norwegian (and English) isn’t very common 🙂 – do you know even more languages?

The only website you have; do you mean the google document with the FAQ, or http://www. fatcow . com/edu/ ? I find the last one difficult to navigate, as it hasn’t got any menu system, and also, the address is a little counterintuitive, why don’t you rather have your own address, like for instance translationforeducation.org ?

Albert appears flattered, but we won’t let his main objective slip. He is copypasting it from his previous mail. His archaic greeting is lifted from the mail before that one. An effective gentleman.

Albert Ward
Apr 17

Greetings,
Nice to hear back from you.
Thank you very much for so warm words about my skills. That’s great!
As for the website I have to tell you that making a separate website costs a lot but our organization is fully volunteer with no budget. That is why we use the site I provided t you.

So, what do you think of my request?
Looking forward to hearing soon from you.

I get a bit too eager, and try to corner him.

Anders Hofseth
Apr 17

Hi Albert
That a separate website is expensive, was maybe true ten years ago, but today you can set up a website for free several places, and registering the url translationforeducation.org (which is available) costs only 5.88 dollars 🙂

We at NRKbeta think your organisation is very interesting, so we have decided to offer your organisation our web development expertise for free, and can assist you in setting up a website. We can even donate the 6 dollars needed to register the site if you have absolutely no budget. Hope you find this interesting 🙂

Also, for the article I’m writing about your organisation, I would like to do an interview with the professor or student who requested a translation of my article, to give some depth and understanding of how the system works, can you help me with an email address?

Also, in your FAQ you say that all the translations are looked through in the end by the university professors who are involved in your project, if the professor who looked through the translation isn’t the same who requested it, it would be cool to talk to him/her as well – the process seems fascinating, and I have a few questions.

Looking forward to hearing from you soon;

-anders

Enter silence. I do not hear from him again.

Which means I never get to confront him with the fact that this looks a lot like a swindle, and that it seems it’s NRKbeta’s relatively search engine-valuable link he’s aiming for. But what’s still unclear to me, is the business side of it. How can he profit on this.

WHY?

So I ask Twitter if there’s anyone out there who can help me figure this out:

NRKbeta has been approached by a guy seeking our permission to translate one of our articles to Bulgarian. The article was to be included in a collection of academic texts translated to minor European languages. The whole inquiry was a little odd – the article seemed randomly picked, and when I received the translation and checked it with a native Bulgarian, it turned out to be a Google Translate with the odd phrase changed. As well it turned out that the website where the translation was located wasn’t organised in any way. It was just a lot of single pages in assorted minor languages. The only thing he wanted from us, was a link back to the translation.

I’ve found out that the person who «translated» the text has done similar inquiries to other institutions (with good page rank as well), and has gotten links back from them.

At NRKbeta we’re normally linking to things we write about. In this particular article we haven’t linked to some of the web sites we’re writing about, to avoid giving them link juice. If you’d like a closer look at the pages we’re writing about, you’ll have to remove the spaces in the URLs. We apologise for the inconvenience.

First question:

Anders: Why do you think NRKbeta received this inquiry?

Magne Uppman, CEO iProspect

Magne: The reason NRKbeta has received this request, is that you have a strong domain, which provides good and valuable links SEO-wise. Link value is very important in the search engine optimisation profession, and if several strong domains are linking to you, you will figure higher in search engines as well. The way it is done here is really on the edge, because the site he’s asking for a link to has zero relevance, it exists solely for SEO purposes. This is in breach of search engine guidelines, but unfortunately some industries are willing to go far to reach the top positions in a Google search. The rewards are large, while the risk of getting caught using illegal methods is small.

Anders: What is SEO?

Magne: SEO, Search Engine Optimisation, is activities done to cause your web page to figure higher in search engine results. Normally, the higher up your web page surfaces, the more visits you get. These activities are often divided into on site and off site activities. On site includes optimisation of the technical side of the web site, and tailoring the content as good as possible. Off site is mainly consisting of working with link strength into the site. The more links you get from other good (and relevant) websites, the greater chances are that search engines will consider your website important as well (therefore ranking you high in the search results). Search engines contribute a great deal to traffic (and sales) to companies’ websites, making it important to optimise this as much as possible.

Anders: The person doing this (who I’ve corresponded a little with, and who seems quite fishy), has done extensive preparations, it seems – and he has followed me up several times. This makes me wonder if he has some kind of economical benefit from this. Is that likely? And if so, how does he make money doing this?

Magne: Certainly. In one of two ways:

1) He’s running a website that’s earning him money. The higher his site figures in search results, the more visits he gets, and the more money he earns.

2) He’s selling SEO services as a consultant / agency, and gets paid by the number of links he gets, per hour, or by the increase in traffic / search position he’s able to achieve for his customers.

Any which way, the way he’s running business is unethical, and against the search engines’ guidelines. This is called «Black Hat SEO», and is punished by the search engines if discovered. Which means the website probably will drop in search results, if the way he is building links is uncovered.

The website where these translations are, is a web host provider. They offer a special SEO package at $99 per month. Is there a possible connection here, or is it impossible to transfer «google juice» from a web host to its customers?

Magne: I conferred with a couple of our experts, this is what they answered. As you can see, it is a little complex…

Agnete Pedersen:In principle, it is incoming links to the domain or the specific page that can increase the page authority and the site authority, not links to a wholly different page on the same server. So my answer to that, would be no. But if you are unlucky enough to be sharing a server with somebody that’s been penalised, it might affect you as well, at least this is hdebated hotly.

SEO packages at $99/month should be avoided anyway, quality comes at a price, and there something not quite right here…

Gaute Andre Larsen: Actually, it is possible to get link juice in other ways than by linking directly to the domain/page. This is called «reverse proxy». It is mainly used if you want «to move» the authority from asub domain (e.g. blog.example.com) to your main domain, instead of having to move all content from blog.example.com to example.co/blog. That is; by using a reverse proxy, your blog can «pretend» to be a subfolder on your website, even if it is on a totally different server.

That said, I have no faith in this particular product. And I would probably advise against it.

Anders: Do you think that whatever he’s tried to exploit NRKbeta for is part of the services offered in this SEO package?

Magne: Yes, I certainly think so.

Anders: What do you think of FatCow’s page rank – is it normal for a web hosting service?

Magne: The authority of this domain is very high, abnormal for a web hosting service.

Anders: What should we do, in your opinion? Should we report this to Google, for instance? (I find links to Ward’s «Bulgarian» translations on code.google.com as well).

Magne: You can report it to Google, then they might do something about it. If it had been in Norway, I would have reported it to BraSøk, the Norwegian trade organisation securing that search work is done ethically. All major Norwegian agencies are members.

Hm. So far the interview with Magne Uppman. This could be how everything relates. It’s a project to make various online services look more attractive.

Who is using these services?

I’ve trawled around Google a bit, in hope of finding out more about who are using «the translation services». Albert(io) wrote the website I provided is the only website we have.

But there are translations at other sites than FatCow.

Several «translations» can be found at webhostinggeeks . com. They’re even referred to from Albert’s FAQ:

By searching for parts of the wording in Albert’s first mail, you find people from «Macedonia», Italy», «Armenia» and so on, waxing lyrical about projects named «Armenian FCW Science», «Geek Science», «WHW Science» etc. The mails have a recipient, copypost.ofice@gmail.com in the CC field. This could be a system for reporting which client should be billed – though there are some discrepancies as to where the «translation» finally ends up.

Using Google search with the site: parameter, we have checked how many documents there are in these subfolders (by way of justice, we should mention that some of the documents in the subfolders are relevant, but samples shows the majority consisting of «translations»).

sorry, but I didn’t really understand, what do you want from us. We
are not affiliated with fatcow or Albertio Ward. But we have got the
same Email from him.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Hello,

I’ve known you website for ages, strictly speaking from year 2009. I
found interesting your publication «Wissenswertes uber die kommende
Android-Version > Technologie Blog | PC . DE» which I googled on
pc . de/software/wissenswertes-kommende-android-version-2550 !
I’d love to use it in a project I’m involved with called «Bulgarian
FCW Science», so I’m seeking your permission for translation to
Bulgarian language. «Bulgarian FCW Science» is a freemium-model
non-English language orientated startup with collection of scientific
articles, personal notes etc. in several languages that is
collaboratively edited by volunteers from around the world since 1999.
Young and old, students and professors – even your neighbor could be a
volunteer member.

If you agree, we will credit you for your work in the resulting
translation’s references by stating that it was based on your work and
is used with your permission, and by mentioning the name of my project
«Bulgarian FCW Science» back to:
http://pc . de/software/wissenswertes-kommende-android-version-2550

Thank you for your time and patience.
I look forward to your response next week.

> Hi
> Still haven’t heard from you on this one.
>
> Some specific questions:
>
> Have I in any way misunderstood the purpose of the translations found on your website?
>
> If not, and you have entered into this to boost your SEO, it would be interresting to hear more about how you came into contact with the people doing this, what things cost, etc.
>
> Or of course if you’d like to add something, correct things etc.
>
> Looking forward to hearing from you.
>
> -anders
>
>
>
>
> On 22. juni 2012, at 12:57, Anders Hofseth wrote:
>
>> Oh. And the enclosed document. Sorry.
>> -anders
>>
>> PS: If you’d like to comment on how you got into contact with the
>> people doing this, how you were approached, etc, it would be
>> interresting 🙂
>>
>> 2012/6/22 Anders Hofseth
>>>
>>> OK; i try again:
>>>
>>> The enclosed article mentions your use of what one interviewee calls Black
>>> Hat SEO.
>>> After a long bout of correspondence with a gentleman acting under the name
>>> of Albert Ward, I wrote the article. It is written in Norwegian, but I’ve
>>> supplied an english transcription (enclosed txt document), which works a lot
>>> better than Google Translate. I will be publishing the article in the middle
>>> of next week.
>>>
>>> IMPORTANT: If you wish to comment on the article, add information, correct
>>> things you see as erroneous etc, we will provide you with the space to do so
>>> in the article. If you want to use your right to do this, you need to inform
>>> me on this before Monday June 25th 2012 1200 GMT, otherwise your right to
>>> contest the content of the article will be lost.
>>>
>>> All the best,
>>> -anders
>>> _________________
>>> Anders Hofseth, NRKbeta
>>>
>>> INTERNETT, MARKEDSFØRING, NETTJENESTER & NRKBETA
>>>
>>> Svindel 2.0: Albertio vil stikke sugerøret i NRKbetas Googlejuice
>>>
>>> AV ANDERS HOFSETH, 20. JUNE, 2012
>>>
>>> Hvorfor vil noen gjerne oversette en av våre artikler til et smalt
>>> europeisk språk? Forklaringen er mer komplisert enn man skulle gjette… (osv)

This means somebody actually answered. At the time of updating this article with this information, there is still a large amount of ”translations” at pc . de:

END OF UPDATE

So…

Somebody is obviously constructing advanced structures of smoke, mirrors and sign pointing at businesses. It’s hard to tell how much money there is in this, the variables are so many, but given the choice between tens and thousands of kroner to earn, Magne Uppman would say thousands. That would correspond with the efforts put up by «Albertio» (and the other names used).

And if you google around a little, you’ll notice there’s a plethora of useful idiots that have been flattered by strangers asking permission to translate something they’ve written – in exchange for a tiny link.

UPDATE: This article now has a follow-up: The hunt for Albertio, where we drill a bit deeper in the operation.

Alex

I’m one of these useful idiots that had put a tiny link to Albert’s translation. Thinking of it retrospectively, it all did seem very strange but it didn’t occur to me how a translation could do any harm. The article which Albert «translated» was also quite technical, so it didn’t cross my mind that this could be targetted by a scammer.

Anyway thanks for your post. I would be interested in writing a translation in French. If you don’t mind all I’d ask in return is a tiny link to my translation 😉

Peter Jackman

Actually, i was working for that company. I can tell much more than you think since i was involved in it. I am from Ex-USSR and all of this business is based here. And, I am not Peter Jackman, as you can understand. I wish not to reveal my identity.

Why am i sharing this info? I don’t know. Just want you to know. Even more, i can provide you with a full list of people who were deceived by this organisation. If you could warn them – it would be great indeed.

The way they promoted (and still are promoting) that sites was perfectly described by you.

More than a 40 people are involved in that business. Some of them are searching for appropriate articles, some of them are translating articles using google docs, some of them are posting the articles. They have nothing to do with White Hat SEO.

They have been working for a couple of years in such a way and, probably more than a thounsand authors were deceived by this organisation.

Wecantranslate – is how they are called, or, at least they are call themselves so. http: // wecantranslate . com/home – is the site.

And, sure, there might have been quality translations. Since we were based in Russia, Ukraine, Moldova, Belarussia and Georgia – we could make good translations into that languages.

The owner of this kind of business is Marcis Gasuns. He is located in Russia. E-mail is XXXXXXXXXXXXXX.
Google+ profile is here – https: // plus . google . com/102146312395420304387/posts
Despite his SEO knowledge he’s not the person you may trust.

Editor’s note: This comment has been held back for fact checking since July 6th 2012 @ 12:15. Editing of URLs and email address has been done by NRKbeta. Full story in the article The hunt for Albertio

[…] part of the email names involved translators and the company behind the scam. It also lists an article by Anders Hofseth which details his experience with the whole thing. The article includes one […]

armen

Quite accidentally i was directed to your page by a google search and started reading this post, then i saw the first screenshot of the fatcow which includes Armenian characters. Being an Armenian it more concerned me so i continued reading it (Please note that even that translation is a pure google translator job, full of mistakes which make it unreadable with no meaning). Unfortunately i read then about «Armenian FCW science», and searching that happened to meet even a link to a page on fatcow on a page from Michigan State University’s web (cs3.msu.edu/resources/) where it says the Armenian translation was provided by …, i checked that translation also and it was again «not a translation» but something from google translator or something alike.
By this comment, I just wanted to express my sorrow and concern for deceptions that take place and where some irresponsible people (who i have no clues if he or anyone in his team were Armenian) put a whole nation into dispute.
Well, i don’t want any links!

Hi Armen
I’ve learned a little bit more about this organisation now, and there doesn’t seem to be any Armenians involved. I’ll be telling you a bit more in a while, but am hung up with other stuff the first few weeks. Stay tuned!